IGN's Wii Game of the Year award goes to....a wiiware title.

[theRepublic]

Impulsivity said:

   What changed?  70% of the items you use are the same, several of the stages even overlap directly.  The 3 divisions are the same (50, 100, 150), mirror courses to try and stretch those stages are the same.  There are a few new characters and a few new stages, does that make the game totally different?  

   Compare link to the past (SNES) with a newer Zelda game or compare Mario World to Mario 64 or Galaxy, huge changes.  The changes to Mario Kart (and Smash Bros) have been primarily cosmetic.  The stages and gameplay are more or less identical.

    I can't think offhand of one major feature besides the one I mentioned (motorcycles) that has changed.  Time trials, Vs mode (which I would argue was BETTER in the SNES and N64 version, that block fort alone was worth hours upon hours of play) with baloons...everything is the same!   Mario Kart Wii isn't even the best version (the N64 version deserves that honor especially for its battle mode).

  Actually...I would argue that the peak of almost all current Nintendo series was the N64 Era now that I'm thinking about it.

   Mario 64 is still the best Mario game, Orciana of Time is still the best Zelda game, Mario Kart 64 is still the best Mario Kart and SSB on N64 had WAY less timing cheese then the later versions even if it had less characters.   On top of that other great N64 games like Diddy Kong Racing, Donkey Kong 64 and Conker never made the trip because Nintendo let Rare get away.  

   I know a lot of people are on the Wii bandwagon and the Wii is far more successful then the N64, but I would contend that the N64 is the peak of Nintendo's core game library.  The only series that has improved on the N64 gen is Metroid with the Prime series, but that was never made for N64 so kind of a wash.

Mario Kart Wii has plenty of differences from older Mario Kart games.  Here are some of them

-Double the number of courses of most other Mario Karts, half of which are new, and half of which are remakes.

-Double the number of battle courses of most other Mario Karts, half new, half remakes

-Many more characters to choose from.

-Many more karts to choose from.

-Motorcycles to choose from.

-More particapants in each race.

-Online - races, battles, ghosts, time trial rankings, bi-monthly tournaments

-Wiimote steering (awesome in my opinion)

So, what else are you going to add or change to make this game better?  The game still needs to be Mario Kart at its heart, so there isn't too much else you can change.